The Lieutenant Wore Skirts or Slinky in the 1950s (1956)
If this actress looks an awful lot like Marilyn Monroe, she was supposed to. This is Sheree North playing opposite Tom Ewell. He is a writer, she is his younger and far prettier wife. The silly plot turns on her re-enlisting in the Air Force and him chasing after her. It can be funny and obviously absurd at the same time. North’s plays an intelligent and competent woman who happens to look like a blonde bombshell.
The top photos are the flashier and more erotic fashions of the 1950s that make the most of North’s figure. These include the slinky skin-tight evening dress which seems to offer up her breasts. Then there is the halter-top bathing suit on Rita Morena as a very friendly upstairs neighbor. You may remember that Ewell was in the Seven Year Itch with Marilyn Monroe as his neighbor. North wears the bright blouse with slim trousers which were a casual at-home look of the 1950s; women did not wear trousers in public except for sports, resorts, beaches, and other casual places until the mid-1960s. The outfits are by William Travilla who worked in Hollywood in the 1940s and 1950s.
True, North spends a fair amount of time in uniform, yet even the uniforms follows trends of 1950s fashion as you see in the last photo. The turned-up cuffs serve no purpose except that they were the fashion of the time. Heer bodice is nipped, and her skirt is the long and flared, a style which dated to the New Look introduced by Christian Dior in 1947. Clearly, the armed forced noticed women’s fashion even as it choose which trends to use.
You can find it on TCM.com here: http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/81320/The-Lieutenant-Wore-Skirts/